London stocks rise but set for monthly decline, BP tumbles

UK's FTSE 100 climbed higher on Tuesday, even as it eyed a monthly decline, as Rolls Royce's rating upgrade boosted aerospace and defence stocks, but BP's weak earnings capped gains on the index. The commodity-focused FTSE 100 was up 0.3% as of 09:08 a.m. GMT. However, the index is set to mark its worst monthly performance since June, falling over 3.4% in October.

BP shares plunged 5.3% to the bottom of the FTSE 100 after the oil company missed third-quarter earnings estimates, hurt by a large drop in energy prices from a year earlier. "Investors have already put BP in another box and the fact that it is still delivering on its share buyback would have cushioned the blow somewhat," said Danni Hewson, head of financial analysis at AJ Bell.

The broader oil and gas index fell 2.4% on the news. The aerospace and defence index gained 0.9%, led by a 4.1% rise in Rolls Royce to the top of FTSE 100 after Barclays raised the stock to overweight from equal-weight.

The mid-cap FTSE 250 added 0.9%, on track for a three-day winning run. However, October 2023 was the worst month for the index in over a year, dropping over 6%. As part of cost-saving measures, British online trading platform IG Group said it would lay off 10% of its workforce, with shares advancing 3%.

Britain's Vodafone lost 1.2% after the telecom company announced the sale of its Spanish business for 5 billion euros ($5.30 billion) to Zegona Communications. Meanwhile, industry data showed prices in British store chains rose at the slowest pace in more than a year in October.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)